UrbanPat

5 ms·

1.
by UrbanPat 15y ago
+1 for Christopher Alexander!
2.
by UrbanPat 15y ago
Details abound: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-03-06/goldman-secret-gree... Greece wasn't innocent in this, but it's pretty obvious that Goldman took advantage of them.
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by UrbanPat 15y ago
You have a point - corruption is endemic to Jefferson County politicians.
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by UrbanPat 15y ago
Did you read the Bloomberg article at all? The county (not the city) didn't piss the money away - they built sewer infrastructure with it. The reason they can't pay it back is because a lack of municipal bond buyers during the recession inv
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by UrbanPat 15y ago
Actually that settlement fell through. Per Bloomberg, "The county’s efforts to negotiate a definitive settlement were frustrated by the recent sale of sewer debt to investors who didn’t want to restructure the bonds under the terms of the S
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by UrbanPat 15y ago
I disagree. The racetrack is a bad analogy, particularly when bankers are specifically hired for their advice. If I sell you a car I designed and the car blows up from a design flaw several years later, I'm culpable. If you hired me specifi
7.
by UrbanPat 15y ago
For the record, I'm certainly not saying that JP Morgan is the only responsible party. Clearly our politicians are at fault, and thus the voters as well. But if you'll read [3] (far more explanatory than [2] about the details), you'll see t
8.
by UrbanPat 15y ago
I'm confused - are you suggesting the sewer is provided by a private company? The sewer system in Jefferson County is publicly run. And maybe that's part of the problem. Presumably a private sewer company could declare bankruptcy, sell its
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by UrbanPat 15y ago
Elections DO matter. A major difference between Birmingham and Atlanta is that Birmingham became the poster city for racism because of the way Bull Conner responded to civil rights protesters in 1963. Atlanta, on the other hand, became know
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by UrbanPat 15y ago
What politician are you referring to? And just for the record, I really like Birmingham. It's a good city. It has had some really terrible politicians, but despite that, it's a really nice place to live. (Though, I must confess, I don't hav
11.
by UrbanPat 15y ago
I live in Birmingham, so I need to correct a couple things. First, the "illegal" tax has been around a long time. In this particular case, it was overturned on a technicality [1]. However, because the state government is hostile to Birmingh
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by UrbanPat 15y ago
Eh, that's doubtful actually. In most US cities (other than, say NYC, SF, and a handful of others), taxi service is expensive and slow to arrive. Parking is free, and cars can be obtained relatively cheaply.
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by UrbanPat 15y ago
Here's a related question: What will cities look like with driverless cars being shared by groups of people? Parking needs will diminish significantly, allowing cities to become more dense, yet because the cost of driving will be reduced (b
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by UrbanPat 15y ago
Yes, that's the whole problem. I'm tired of paying for other people's airline miles, cashback, etc. This is an inefficiency built into the payment system, and it harms small businesses and lower-income people the most. I try to avoid using
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by UrbanPat 15y ago
What do you mean by "SQL Libraries"? Do these interface with SQL to perform analysis?
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by UrbanPat 15y ago
Wow, thanks for the NSFW title...
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by UrbanPat 15y ago
It's a clever trick!
18.
Microsoft Security Essentials removes Google Chrome(zdnet.com)
3 points by UrbanPat 15y ago|1 comments
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by UrbanPat 15y ago
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/2116548608/help-erase-th...